Retinal Polarimetry Discriminating Algorithms

University of Arizona
posted on 11/04/2009

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Background: Non-invasive methods to detect lesions in human tissue, including the eye, are of great interest.  Several technologies such as fundus imaging and Optical Coherence Tomography have been used as diagnostic tools, but they lack information regarding the polarization of ocular structures.  Polarization has been demonstrated to be an important source of information. Although some techniques address this lack, such as the GDx Retinal Polarimeter, they do not provide the detailed diagnositc information revealed by linear retardance, diattenuation, and depolarization for all possible polarization states.

A Professor at the College of Optical Sciences has developed a method, apparatus, and computer program that measures, calculates,  and utilizes all degrees of freedom of depolarization of the Mueller matrix obtained from the reflected image of tissue.  The novel analysis introduces new depolarization metrics that give better details about the specific contributions to depolarization revealed in the tissue sample.

Applications:
• Lesion detection in retinal and ocular tissue.
• Target and texture recognition
• Optical testing

Advantages:
• Provides far more information than other similar devices
• Complete characterization in a simple and user-friendly program
• The program can be adapted for a broad set of applications
• Easy to implement on present retinal polarimeters, thus reducing cost.

Stage of Development: A prototype has been built and tested, showing successful measurement of the desired polarization parameters.

Status:  Patent issued; Patent No. 7,612,880

Refer to Case# UA04-005